Dave Portnoy has suggested that suspended Jimmy Kimmel has no one to blame but himself for being taken off the air following his ‘offensive’ comments on the death of Charlie Kirk.
The late-night talk show host was pulled off the air ‘indefinitely’ by ABC over his divisive comments regarding the assassination of political commentator Kirk.
The veteran host’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! will be removed from the network ‘for the foreseeable future,’ a spokesperson announced on Wednesday.
Many left-wing leaning celebrities leapt to Kimmel’s defense following the drastic move with some branding it an attack on free speech, while other social media users have claimed the host is the latest victim of cancel culture.
But Barstool Sports chief Portnoy, who fired his own member of staff earlier this week for sending a message to Kirk’s family, hit back at those claims as he suggested Kimmel was merely facing the consequences of his actions.
‘With Kimmel getting canned I’m seeing lots of people talking about the hypocrisy of cancel culture,’ the outspoken media mogul posted in a rant on X. ‘To me Cancel culture is when people go out of their way to dig up old tweets, videos etc looking for dirt on somebody they don’t like in an effort to get them fired.
Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy has spoken out on the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel (L)
‘Like if Kimmel got canceled for s*** he did on the Man Show that would be cancel culture. But when a person says something that a ton of people find offensive, rude, dumb in real time and then that person is punished for it that’s not cancel culture. That is consequences for your actions.’
Kimmel made controversial statements about Kirk on Monday following his assassination last week at Utah Valley University – and said during his monologue that the ‘MAGA gang’ was trying to gain political points over Kirk’s murder.
The suspected shooter Tyler Robinson, 22, has since been taken into custody and appeared in court on Tuesday on multiple charges, including aggravated murder.
Kimmel also falsely insinuated that Robinson was conservative – despite investigators stating he has far-left ideologies and was also in a romantic relationship with his transgender roommate.
The network’s affiliate group, Nexstar, additionally shared on Wednesday that it ‘strongly objects’ to Kimmel’s comments and ‘will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets.’
Kimmel was reportedly set to address his remarks on his show Wednesday night, before he received news that he had been axed, according to Deadline.
He is now said to be livid over the sudden change of plans.
The television personality’s remarks had caught instant flak from Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr, who told conservative podcaster Benny Johnson earlier on Wednesday that he was considering an investigation into Kimmel and his network ABC for his claims.
Portnoy hit back at claims that the late-night talk host was a victim of cancel culture
The media mogul is pictured with Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated last week, in 2019
‘When you look at the conduct that has taken place by Jimmy Kimmel, it appears to be some of the sickest conduct possible,’ Carr told Johnson.
‘As you’ve indicated, there are avenues here for the FCC, so there… are some ways in which I need to be a little bit careful because we could be called ultimately to be a judge on some of these claims that come up,’ Carr said.
Following the news of Kimmel’s cancelation, Carr told Fox News’ Sean Hannity that he was simply ‘suffering the consequences’ of his actions.
He accused the networks of subsidizing late night talk shows, and said that the FCC expects them ‘to broadly serve the public interests’ as he faces an internal divide at the agency – which is leaving him and his former protege Nathan Simington trying to curry favor with President Donald Trump.
‘I’m very glad to see that America’s broadcasters are standing up to serve the interest of their community,’ Carr said, after arguing that late night hosts are ‘enforcing a very narrow political ideology.’
Kimmel’s comments about Robinson came during his Monday night monologue.
‘We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it,’ the host said.
Kirk, 31, had been shot and killed at Utah Valley University on September 10 – in front of an audience of 3,000 horrified spectators – Kimmel reacted to his death online.
Kirk (pictured with his family) was a co-founder of the political nonprofit Turning Point USA
Shortly after the shooting, Kimmel wrote on social media: ‘Instead of the angry finger-pointing, can we just for one day agree that it is horrible and monstrous to shoot another human?’ Kimmel wrote.
‘On behalf of my family, we send love to the Kirks and to all the children, parents and innocents who fall victim to senseless gun violence.’
But he appeared to change his tune before his monologue on Monday.
Meanwhile, a livid Portnoy hit back at a Barstool intern earlier this week, who came forward to claim he had been fired over his response to Kirk’s death.
Shortly after Kirk’s shocking death, a user on X came forward and claimed they had been running Barstool Texas Tech’s account at the time, before being fired days later.
The user claimed that he’d sent out a post calling for ‘prayers’ to the family of Kirk, in the wake of the news, before being dismissed by Barstool for doing so.
Taking to social media, the user – named ‘TortillaSniper’ – wrote: ‘Running Barstool TTU was a dream of mine.
‘I was proud to represent Texas Tech and be part of what I thought was a brand that stood for being real, unfiltered, and different. But after what just happened, I’m disgusted I was ever involved with this company.
Portnoy hit back at a former intern who claimed they were fired for posting a tribute message to the family of Kirk
The user shared a lengthy statement in which he labelled Barstool a ‘fraud of a company’
Portnoy swiftly fired back and insisted that the user in question failed to ‘follow the rules’
‘On September 10th, Charlie Kirk was murdered. A husband and father of two young kids had his life taken. I made a simple post offering prayers for his family. No politics. No agenda. Just basic human decency.
‘Barstool’s response? I was yelled at, locked out of the accounts, and tossed aside without warning. Their excuse? ‘We don’t talk about politics.’ That’s a joke.
‘Barstool talks politics whenever it benefits them they pick and choose their moments. But apparently, praying for a grieving family is where they draw the line.
‘Dave Portnoy and Barstool love to pretend they’re rebels, that they’re uncensored, that they’re different. The truth? They’re hypocrites. Weak.
‘A fraud of a company that silences its own people for showing humanity. They’ll exploit tragedy when it gets clicks, but fire someone for showing empathy’.
After the user’s post went viral, many fans called for a response from Barstool boss Portnoy. And it didn’t take long for him to fire back.
Taking to X, he wrote: ‘I hate this kid. He was an intern in a program of 200 interns. We have pretty hard and fast rules not to do politics or personal opinions on those accounts. This was in place before any of this.
‘If you run a brand account for any company you don’t do personal stuff from the brand. It’s day 1 stuff. We don’t want 200 teenage interns giving their takes on the world. Every single account followed the rules.
‘He was the only 1 that didn’t and then he also started fighting with people in comments calling them a**holes . It had nothing to do with what he said and just how we run a massive intern program.
‘To be honest I didn’t even know it happened till I saw this kid call me a fraud. Maybe if he reached out to me first instead of going wacko I coulda helped. So I have no sympathy for him. He’s trying to use this to build his career. Scumbag move to be honest’.
